BoysRBackinTown
Member
I’m currently doing Dennis Murphy’s Affordable Accuracy Monitor mod on an old pair of BS22s, and a thing that strikes me about them is the platonic ideal of a speaker mod. It’s not just that it takes a solid speaker and makes it great, it is that it does so with easily accessible parts, public knowledge and a base that, during its time, went on sale constantly. It meets people half way and isn’t going to break the bank. Like the Realistic Minimus 7 mods of old, they sold a million of these things, although Pioneer long since retired them.
This led me to an obvious question: what would today's Affordable Accuracy Monitor mod look like, and is it even possible? What is a plentiful speaker that is already quite good but suffers from a handful of weaknesses that a home hobbyist could fix? The Sehlin mod by @Mudjock is the best example since, although the Swans are a full kit. In the mic building world, the AKG Perception mod is another good example: a single capacitor tweaks a miscalculation about the tone of the capsule and gets it shockingly close to a u87.
Based on the current recommended passive speaker list a few options seem promising.
Again this is just a thought experiment. I agree with the wisdom that money spent on mods is more often better spent just buying better speakers, particularly when you factor in new drivers and crossover tweaks. You shouldn’t mod a speaker just for the sake of doing it. I am also aware that speaker design is complex, very difficult, and that hobbyists are going up against professionals. But compromises are often made at scale to get a good enough result. So, is an equivalent to an Affordable Accuracy Monitor even possible today? And what would that mod even look like?
This led me to an obvious question: what would today's Affordable Accuracy Monitor mod look like, and is it even possible? What is a plentiful speaker that is already quite good but suffers from a handful of weaknesses that a home hobbyist could fix? The Sehlin mod by @Mudjock is the best example since, although the Swans are a full kit. In the mic building world, the AKG Perception mod is another good example: a single capacitor tweaks a miscalculation about the tone of the capsule and gets it shockingly close to a u87.
Based on the current recommended passive speaker list a few options seem promising.
- Dayton Audio MK402X
- Polk Audio XT15
- Polk Audio XT20
- Kef Q150
- Monoprice Monolith Encore B6
Again this is just a thought experiment. I agree with the wisdom that money spent on mods is more often better spent just buying better speakers, particularly when you factor in new drivers and crossover tweaks. You shouldn’t mod a speaker just for the sake of doing it. I am also aware that speaker design is complex, very difficult, and that hobbyists are going up against professionals. But compromises are often made at scale to get a good enough result. So, is an equivalent to an Affordable Accuracy Monitor even possible today? And what would that mod even look like?